Free Google Ads Audit for Solar Installers

If you run a solar business and advertise on Google, you already know how fast the budget disappears. A single lead — a full residential or commercial solar install — can be worth real money, so every wasted click hurts. The trouble is, most solar installers have no independent way to check whether their Google Ads are actually working, or whether the agency running them is quietly burning the budget. That’s exactly what a free Google Ads audit for solar installers from Kestrel is for.

Kestrel is an independent watchdog, not an agency. We connect to your Google Ads account read-only, run all 40 checks, and tell you in plain English what’s healthy, what’s wasting money, and what to fix — without ever changing a thing in your account.

Why solar installers struggle with their marketing agencies

Here’s the uncomfortable truth most solar installers eventually run into: you’re paying a marketing agency every month, the reports look fine, but you genuinely cannot tell whether the money is working. You’re a solar business owner, not a PPC specialist — so when the agency talks about impressions and CTR and “optimisations,” you have to take their word for it. That information gap is where the frustration starts.

The specific problem for solar installers is that agencies often report “leads” that are years away from buying, not the ready-to-quote homeowners you need. It’s rarely malicious — sometimes it’s just a junior account manager spread across forty clients — but the result is the same: your budget leaks and nobody tells you. The most common frustrations we hear from solar installers are:

• “The reports are all green, but the phone isn’t ringing.” Pretty dashboards that don’t match what you see in the diary.
• “I don’t know if these leads are even real.” Conversions that look great on paper but never become booked jobs.
• “I can’t log into my own account.” The account sits inside the agency’s login, so you can’t check anything yourself.
• “They’re spending on the wrong searches.” You’re a solar business, but you’re paying for clicks that were never going to call.
• “I’m locked into a contract and I’m not sure why.” No clear scope, no easy exit, no straight answers.

If any of those sound familiar, you’re not being difficult — you’re being reasonable. You just need an independent set of eyes on the account. Start by reading the signs your agency might be ripping you off, or run the free audit and see the numbers for yourself.

The problems hiding in your solar business’s account

When Kestrel audits accounts for solar installers, the same expensive problems turn up again and again. These are the checks that matter most for your industry — and the ones an agency report rarely shows you:

• Broken conversion tracking. This is the big one. If your account counts page views or every button click as a “lead,” Google’s AI optimises toward cheap clicks that never call. You see a glowing conversion rate while the work dries up. Kestrel’s conversion tracking check tells you whether your tracking is actually firing — or has quietly gone silent.
• Wasted searches. Without a maintained negative-keyword list, solar installers end up burning budget on “solar” researchers years from buying instead of ready-to-quote intent. Kestrel’s wasted searches check surfaces the junk searches you paid for over the last 30 days, so you can see exactly where the money went.
• Missed impressions. Sometimes the problem is the opposite — you’re not showing for searches like “solar panel installation”, “solar quote”, “home battery storage” because budgets ran dry or bids were too low. Kestrel’s missed impressions check shows what you lost to budget and what you lost to low bids.
• Risky account changes. Google auto-applies changes, and so do agencies — not all of them helpful. Kestrel’s account changes check lists what’s been changed in the last 14 days and flags the risky ones.
• Dead areas. You may be paying to advertise in locations that never convert. Kestrel’s area performance check separates your profitable areas from the dead ones — vital when no proper lead-value tracking, so a $15k install looks the same as a tyre-kicker enquiry.
• Performance Max black boxes. If you’re running Performance Max, it can spend a fortune with almost no visibility. Kestrel’s Performance Max check shows the spend, the jobs and the real return.
• Disapproved ads. Ads that are silently disapproved or broken drag down your whole account. Kestrel’s ad problems check flags them so you’re not paying to run ads that barely show.

How Kestrel’s 40 checks help solar installers

Kestrel runs the same 40 checks a senior PPC specialist would, grouped into account health, spend efficiency and growth, then rolls them into a single health score out of 100. For a solar business, that score is the thing you’ve been missing — one honest number you can watch move as problems get fixed.

Every finding comes with a plain-English explanation: what’s wrong, what it’s costing you, and what to do about it. No jargon, no impression-share riddles. Because Kestrel is read-only and independent, it has no reason to flatter anyone — not Google, and not the agency running your ads. It just tells you the truth about your account:

• Whether your conversions are real, so you stop optimising toward fake leads.
• Exactly which searches wasted money, so you can cut them.
• Whether you’re missing genuine customers to budget or low bids.
• Which areas earn their keep and which to switch off.
• What changed in your account recently — and whether it was safe.
• One health score that tells you, at a glance, if your solar business is in good shape.

Is your agency actually delivering?

If an agency runs your Google Ads, you deserve to know whether they’re earning their fee. Kestrel gives you an honest second opinion that doesn’t answer to them. Many solar installers are surprised by what an independent audit turns up. Read how to tell if your agency is doing a good job, or run the free audit and see your real numbers.

Own your own account

One thing every solar business should check: do you actually own your Google Ads account, or is it locked inside your agency’s login? If you can’t log in yourself, you don’t really own your data or your history. Here’s how to find out who owns your account and how to take back control.

Related industry audits

• Google Ads audit for Dentists & Orthodontists
• Google Ads audit for Cosmetic & Skin Clinics
• Google Ads audit for Physio & Chiropractic

Want to go deeper? Read our Google Ads audit checklist, learn how to find wasted spend in Google Ads, or see how fake conversions quietly drain accounts.

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